The bright stars fade

They have the same effect on all of them. Lure them in, smile, make them think they’re the only pebble on the beach. Screaming laughter after they’ve gone. God bless my deaf ears. Those two Delilah’s in there don’t realize that they’ll be old crones soon enough. Beauty fades, and fast. Sucker them in, girls, better land one before he he he realizes what you are about. Then God’s curse on the bitch’s bastard. Ruffled their feathers it did, that that kid piano tuner, blind as he is, paid them no notice at all. Proved their invisibility to them. They don’t exist unless they think they have a man wanting whatever beauty they possess under those scales. Play a man like a fiddle. Look at Kennedy there, ignoring that one for all she’s worth. That’s an art, boys, that takes some skill. Drives them wild every damn time. She knows what they want. And that other one stretching over him with the clocks on his socks sipping that violet syrupy nonsense. He’s a male version of them getting Doce’s best show, snapping her bra, ringing in the hour. Let’s hear the time. Twelve men a day or she’s not happy. Flatter them, then cling with chipped talons and devour them whole. Maneaters. Customers coming in, two, middling in age. They’ll take a table with a view: want to see, not be seen. Married, likely. They’ll watch and won’t realize their own deafness until they leave. Poor bastards. They’ll hear the music, though, and why not? They have memory and anticipation, same as you. Same as me. I hear it. I hear the music all the time: voiceless songs sung from within. Sometimes I go for the old slow blues numbers: Ray Charles in the day; Eartha Kitt, Miss Kitt to you. When I want to pick it up a bit I hear the big bands. Benny Goodman and his orchestra doing Sing Sing Sing. In my mind, mind. I expect; I remember. Feeling a little allegretto. Going to run some Louis Prima between my ears for a while.